Recent discussions over similarities and differences between feminist security studies (FSS) and feminist global political economy (FGPE) approaches invite us to reflect on the underlying assumptions about knowledge production within feminist international relations (IR) more broadly (Allison Reference Allison2015; Enloe Reference Enloe2015; see also the introduction to this forum). I use Nepali women ex-combatants’ life stories to make two specific points relating to these discussions.Footnote 1 First, I illustrate how the separation of security and political economy issues cannot fully account for their life experiences. Second, and by way of overcoming this separation, I show how by beginning with life stories, we can develop a holistic analysis that challenges the broader Eurocentric politics of feminist IR knowledge production.
Gender narratives in Nepal are shaped by the divide between security and political economy: there is a tendency to focus either on security issues, such as on sexual and gender-based violence or the implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325, or on political economy issues, such as gendered development or migration dynamics. This analytical divide manifests itself through gender tropes in media and development discourse and in policy-oriented research. My conversations with women Maoist ex-combatants highlight how their life stories challenge the artificial divide and are characterized by close links and tensions between security and political economy issues, of which these women are acutely aware. However, their experiences have been mostly understood through an FSS lens (Khadka Reference Khadka2012; Lohani-Chase Reference Lohani-Chase2008; Pettigrew and Shneiderman Reference Pettigrew and Shneiderman2003). Yet by focusing on the “security” aspects of these women's lives, we miss the diversity and messiness of their experiences, which are also shaped by economic concerns.
Post/decolonial (feminist) scholars have challenged the embeddedness of certain approaches to feminist analysis in broader modern knowledge practices and the implications thereof (Allison Reference Allison2015; Enloe Reference Enloe2015 Lugones Reference Lugones2010; Mignolo Reference Mignolo2012). Thereby, feminists are critiqued for relying too heavily on Enlightenment paradigms of reason and progress, subject/object dualisms, and atemporal universalism of knowledge and for reproducing boundary-drawing practices and dissecting and boxing people's lives into narrow subjectivities. Such knowledge practices tend to produce exclusions and silences, deny agency and voice, and reinforce gendered and racialized structures of global inequality (Grosfoguel Reference Grosfoguel2007; Tickner Reference Tickner2006; Toulmin Reference Toulmin1992). Among the various proposals of post/decolonial and feminist scholars on how to move beyond these practices, there is the call to take seriously “feminist curiosity” (Enloe Reference Enloe2004) to carefully listen to people's stories and always be ready to be surprised and challenged. As Enloe reminds us, “we need to keep asking ourselves, How do we make sense of women's and men's gendered political lives without shying away from their wonderful ‘messiness’?” (2015, 438). Asking these questions places life stories at the center of our analysis and allows us to not get stuck in boxes and boundary-drawing practices but to create space for fragmentation and contradictions. It also pushes us to ask ourselves how we relate to the stories we analyze.
Taking Enloe seriously, this contribution demonstrates briefly the two dominant gender tropes regarding Nepali women—the poor helpless woman and the female combatant—before showing how, by beginning with life stories, we can overcome the analytical separation between security and political economy issues within feminist IR.
DOMINANT GENDER TROPES IN THE NEPALI CONTEXT
The trope of the poor, helpless Nepali woman emerged with the arrival of the development industry in the 1950s (Tamang Reference Tamang and Visweswaran2011). In the imaginaries of the international development community, the country was an attractive development laboratory. Some have argued that this created similar erasures and silencing of living knowledge traditions, as colonialism did in other contexts (Pigg Reference Pigg1992). This trope remains situated within broader international discourses on gender and development that created the identity of the poor third-world woman in its various guises (Mohanty Reference Mohanty1984). It continues to dominate mainstream discourses in Nepal and much of the internationally driven development work in the country.
The trope of the woman combatant emerged out of a 10-year-long civil conflict in Nepal (1996–2006). Women and girls constituted an estimated 30% to 40% of the Maoist political and military wings and were at the forefront of the struggle for intersectional transformations (International Crisis Group Reference Group2005, 16). Official Maoist ideology in Nepal emphasizes the importance of the role of women and includes an explicit commitment to end discrimination against women, but their voices have often been marginalized (Lohani-Chase Reference Lohani-Chase2008, 154ff.). This trope depicts women combatants as fierce, brave, selfless, and willing to be martyrs, carrying guns and fighting alongside their male comrades. Such depictions influence the perception of women in Nepal, as one Maoist combatants has argued: “today, the image of tired malnourished women carrying children and herding cattle has been transformed into the image of dignified fighting women with guns” (Hisila Yami, quoted in Tamang Reference Tamangn.d., 7).
Both tropes illustrate the simplistic portrayals of Nepali women and the dichotomous subjectivity boxes: the development/FGPE subject and the FSS subject of the woman combatant. Yet the experiences of Nepali women are much more diverse. Starting with the life stories of women ex-combatants, we can overcome these analytical divides and listen to these stories in a more holistic way.
MOVING BEYOND THE DIVIDE
Amrita joined the People's Liberation Army (PLA) when she was 14. Footnote 2 She was born in a rural community in western Nepal. Being a girl from a low caste, she was not allowed to go to school and was assigned to housework. She learned how to read and write by herself while herding cattle and later rebelled against her parents and managed to start school at the age of 10. When she was 11, her family arranged a wedding for her without her consent and she was no longer allowed to go to school. She refused to get married, threatening with suicide, her family had to pay to cancel the wedding and she got expelled from her family. Spending time with Maoist combatants who visited her community, she decided to join the PLA. During her time with the PLA, she became involved in political activities, continued her education and participated in combat. Since the official end of the conflict, she continues her education and involvement in politics and the struggle for intersectional justice.
Urmila was born in the Ghurka region and joined the PLA when she was 17, motivated by the struggle for social change in Nepali society, as well as by her experience of the killing of her family members by the Nepali armed forces. During her time in the PLA, she was involved in various combat and noncombat activities and headed a medical team. After the signing of the peace agreement, she went to a cantonment. The cantonment felt like a prison and brought up a lot of frustration among ex-combatants. When she got pregnant, she had to leave, as the living conditions were not good enough to raise a baby. After leaving the cantonment, she set up a cosmetics shop. Her husband emigrated for work to Saudi Arabia. She thinks that her experience within the PLA helped her to become a businesswoman. Urmila is well aware of the contradictions of her new situation: while with the PLA, she fought against the discrimination and commodification of women, for example through cosmetics, whereas now she runs a cosmetics shop. At the same time, she is involved in Maoist party discussions around alternative collective forms of income generation and economic production, but she also criticizes the party for abandoning its members.
Amrita and Urmila were both “poor” but not helpless. They got involved in politics and activism at a young age, rebelled against their families, and struggled against intersectional discrimination before, during, and after their involvement with the PLA. They are fighters, entrepreneurs, and activists, combining seemingly incompatible subjectivities. Their complex and “messy” lives defy and challenge the analytical separations between security and political economy. Neither a FSS nor a FGPE lens allows us to fully understand the imbrication of, and the tensions between, various dimensions of their lives.
If we take a more holistic approach and take seriously the call for feminist curiosity, new paths of analysis emerge. We can see how security and political economy issues interlink in their lives prior to joining the PLA, in the motives for joining the PLA, their time with the PLA and in the cantonments, and their lives after the conflict. We can understand their motives to join the armed struggle as a combination of a lack of economic possibilities and a struggle against intersectional inequalities and insecurities. Decisions to leave the cantonment before the end of the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) process and, as a result, risking exclusion from compensation were also shaped by security, economic, and political concerns, providing a fuller understanding of reintegration processes. Their life stories reveal how their political engagement cuts across these concerns, which reflects a fundamental characteristic of the Maoist struggle in Nepal. For example, in an appeal that marked the beginning of the insurgency, the Maoists stated that “whereas this state has been treating women as second class citizens for long, now it has intensified rape, trafficking and the process of commoditisation through advertisements, against them” (C.P.N. [Maoist] 1996). The Maoist demands included, “Patriarchal exploitation and discrimination against women should be stopped. Daughters should be allowed access to paternal property”Footnote 3 (C.P.N. [Maoist] 1996). This illustrates the integrated approach to gender transformation adopted by the Maoist movement. For example, associating gender-based violence concerns with economic issues, they challenged discriminatory dress codes, oppressive dowry traditions, and child marriage and promoted intercaste marriages and the remarriage of widows (Gautam, Banskota, and Manchanda Reference Gautam, Banskota, Manchanda and Manchanda2001; Lohani-Chase Reference Lohani-Chase2008).
Taking seriously and relating to stories of women ex-combatants also provides an opportunity to let ourselves be surprised and our theories unsettled. These stories challenge the tendency in certain feminist IR analyses to associate empowerment with nonviolent action and to divide empowerment into its political and economic dimensions, focusing on the latter. Moreover, their experience also questions the current tendency to reduce economic empowerment to individualist income-generating projects, such as in the current women, peace, and security agenda and DDR processes (see the contributions by Suzanne Bergeron, Carol Cohn, and Claire Duncanson and by Soumita Basu in this forum). Instead, these stories highlight the coexistence of seemingly contradictory elements. For example, with her cosmetics shop, Urmila is simultaneously engaged in capitalist economic processes while also fighting against gender discrimination associated with such processes (i.e., the commodification of women's bodies) and participating in processes of transforming economic policy in Nepal and experimenting with alternative production models.
Their life stories reveal the artificiality of the analytical divisions and the boundary drawing and boxing practices we as feminist scholars often use. They also demonstrate what we lose when we attempt to fix these experiences into particular analytical boxes. Starting with life stories, we create space for complexity and messiness in our analyses. Are we ready to learn from their experiences and the ways in which they deal with tensions and messiness? Doing so requires rethinking the knowledge politics of feminist IR and its embeddedness in modern knowledge practices, which produce exclusions and silences and deny agency and voice. It also opens space to creatively look for alternative ways to relate to people's stories that allow us to take into account the fragmented and contradictory nature of life and to challenge the artificial security/economy divide.
